1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an improvement of a clutch-manipulation assist mechanism.
2. Description of Background Art
As a conventional clutch-manipulation assist mechanism, there has been known a clutch-manipulation assist mechanism which extends a wire cable from a clutch lever to a clutch mechanism of an engine, and mounts a sensor which detects the manipulation of the clutch lever on an intermediate portion of the wire cable.
Hereinafter, the above-mentioned clutch-manipulation assist mechanism shown in FIG. 1 to FIG. 3 of JP-A-2005-67450 is explained.
A clutch lever 12 is mounted on a handle of a motorcycle, a clutch mechanism is mounted on an engine 11 of the motorcycle, and a clutch arm 13 and the clutch lever 12 for operating the clutch mechanism are connected with each other using a wire cable 14.
An actuator 20 is mounted on an intermediate portion of the wire cable 14.
The actuator 20 is constituted of a housing 21, a swing lever 23 which is swingably mounted on the housing 21 and has a distal end thereof connected to an inner cable of the wire cable 14, a sensor 24 which detects a swinging angle of the swing lever 23 when the swing lever 23 is swung along with a manipulation of the clutch lever 12, an electrically-operated motor 22 which assists the swinging of the swing lever 23, and a CPU (not shown in the drawing) which controls an operation of the electrically-operated motor 22 based on a signal from the sensor 24.
The wire cable 14 is constituted of a wire cable 14A on a side of the clutch lever 12 of the swing lever 23, and a wire cable 14B on a side of the engine 11 of the swing lever 23.
The actuator 20 is connected to the clutch arm 13 by way of the wire cable 14B and hence, the sensor 24 is arranged remote from the clutch mechanism. Accordingly, for example, when an inner wire of the wire cable 14B is elongated, there arises a difference in the swinging angle of the swing lever 23 which is detected by the sensor 24 and a cutoff state of the clutch in the clutch mechanism between a case in which the inner wire of the wire cable 14B is elongated and a case in which the inner wire of the wire cable 14B is not elongated in the manipulation of the clutch lever 12. As a result, along with the elongation of the inner wire of the wire cable 14B, assist timing or an assist force generated by the electrically-operated motor 22 may differ from originally set values depending on a cutoff state or cutoff timing of the clutch.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a clutch-manipulation assist mechanism which can respond to a power cutoff by a clutch with a favorable responsiveness.